The whole debate was far more politically charged than its roots in dry philology may have suggested. Many traditionalist writers viewed the arrival of certain aspects of Western popular culture, such as rok and narkotiki, to be as great a danger to the Russian way of life as the emergence of the words themselves was a threat to the language. Western cultural and linguistic imperialism was following hard on the heels of the deadening effects of Soviet sloganizing. In the late 1960s, the writer Konstantin Paustovsky had claimed in an article in Literaturnaya Gazeta that the language was degenerating into bureaucratic slang, and as recently as July 1989, an article in Literaturnaya Rossiya had urged the Supreme Soviet to pass laws of linguistic defense. Solzhenitsyn was, therefore, stepping into a highly topical minefield when he chose to side with the traditionalists against the modernists. “The Russian language is his element, his substance in life”, Nikita Struve explained. “It is natural for an exiled writer.”1
Solzhenitsyn’s desire to nurture and preserve the purity of the language did not spring from motives of a retrogressive or reactionary nature but was derived from a passionate belief that the richness of the Russian language itself gave rise to opportunities for innovation. It was his intention to emphasize these opportunities and to stress that, as a living tongue, Russian could evolve vividly and vibrantly without recourse to alien appendages. “Russian, with its suffixes and prefixes, is still a living language, where it is possible to create new words”, Struve said. “Solzhenitsyn’s works are testimony to its regenerating power.”2
Although Solzhenitsyn had been working on the dictionary for many years, ever since his days in the labor camps,3 his work on it had been reinvigorated after he had seen Stephan, his youngest son, typing. “It was a way to bring his Russian son closer to the language”, Struve explained.4 In fact, Struve, in making this statement, unwittingly summarized the vocational trinity at the heart of Solzhenitsyn’s inspiration during the years of exile. First and foremost, he was a writer, and the literary aspects of his life invariably took precedence over everything else. Yet, as his son Ignat had testified, he was a naturally gifted teacher and a considerate father. It was not surprising, therefore, that as patriarch and tutor he should gain inspiration for his literary endeavors from the desire to educate his children. Fatherhood was itself a creative force.
Fatherhood was, however, an obligation as well as an inspiration, and he and Alya made every effort to fulfill their parental duties in the difficult and unusual cultural circumstances in which they found themselves. Yermolai, Ignat, and Stephan were encouraged to assimilate with the indigenous culture in which they were living without losing their Russian culture and heritage. It was a difficult balancing act, which, to judge by results, was achieved with distinction.
Yermolai, the eldest of Solzhenitsyn’s sons, was a particularly gifted schoolboy who was graded three years ahead of his age. Yet even this superlative achievement may not have done the child prodigy the justice he warranted; the Russian scholar Alexis Klimoff, visiting Vermont to discuss translations, found the three teenagers studying subjects at a level ten years ahead of their peers. Without doubt, this was due largely to the quality of the home schooling they had received from their parents, along with the religious instruction from Father Tregubov, a priest from the Orthodox Church at Claremont. According to D. M. Thomas, it was “all part of the rich and rigorous demands placed upon them”.5 As a twelve-year-old, Yermolai had helped his mother by setting one of his father’s works on their computer. Desiring to maximize his son’s evident potential, Solzhenitsyn sent Yermolai to Eton for his final two years in school. “I would say that my father sending me to school at Eton was a reflection of his respect for the quality of education available there,” Yermolai wrote, “and I am grateful for his decision to do so.”6
My two years at Eton did not I think leave me with any specifically English traits (to the extent that I do not feel I could usefully disaggregate them), although I certainly grew to love and appreciate the wealth and possibilities of the English language—something that I had not encountered in Vermont to nearly the same degree. That is perhaps the greatest gift I took away from that A-Level experience. When I was at Eton my fellow students would often say that the true measure of our opinion of the school was whether or not we would send our own children there. I would hesitate to answer such a question today, not the least for having little idea of what kind of place Eton would be a decade and more down the road. I think Eton could benefit through losing some of its “stiffness”. As for the quality of the learning—it was tremendous. A great faculty and a real stimulus for probing deeper into the subjects of study are characteristic of the College.7
On a more general level, Yermolai’s memories of England itself were necessarily colored by those of the school—seeing as it was of the boarding variety—and were thus somewhat limited. Nevertheless, his view, limited or otherwise, was extremely positive: “I very much like England, and am always happy to visit there when I get the chance. Its contributions to world civilization are monumental, and British humour will (most of the time) find in me a great fan.”8
After his time at Eton, Yermolai returned to the United States where he read Chinese at Harvard.
Ignat was no less gifted than his older brother. He made his solo debut as a pianist with the Windham Community Orchestra, performing Beethoven’s Piano Concerto no. 2, when he was still only eleven years old. Like Yermolai, he continued his studies in England. Not unreasonably, D. M. Thomas concluded that Solzhenitsyn “must have valued English education”,9 yet Ignat insisted that “there was no master-plan to send us there” and that “it was essentially a coincidence”.10
My moving to England was for one specific reason, which was to study with the extraordinary piano pedagogue Maria Curcio, who taught (and continues) privately in London. Concurrently, I enrolled to complete my A-Levels at the Purcell School, then located in Harrow, since I had not completed high school in the US before moving to London. I spent a total of three years in London. It was not easy at first. I think England is not the easiest country for a fourteen-year-old to move to on his own. But gradually I made some wonderful friends, and of course soaked up the great concert life and museums of London. I now look back fondly on those years as formative in my personal and musical life. I have come back often to visit, and will continue to do so.11
After completing his studies in England, Ignat returned to the United States and enrolled at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, one of the finest music schools in the world, to pursue a double degree in piano and in conducting. While there, his performing activities continued to expand, and eventually he signed with Columbia Artists, a major music management in New York.
Stephan, the youngest of the brothers, received his B.A. from Harvard and a Master’s in City Planning from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, so completing the successful educational careers of the Solzhenitsyns’ prodigious offspring. The three boys had harvested the fruits of their parents’ labors on their behalf, as well as laboring diligently on their own account. D. M. Thomas depicted the home life which the boys had enjoyed since infancy and which was the secret of their ultimate success, as an “ordered harmony… a productive hive, a rich simplicity”. Solzhenitsyn and “his loving disciples”, wrote Thomas, had “farmed the grain of the spirit”.12